Like the BBB, the homeBBBrew board is not a club, just a place to talk about making beer. Is there a swap you would like to
see happen? If we can find a few others who have something similar then lets do it!

I just exchanged emails with MikeT about a beer I'm brewing this weekend. I've been growing a Brett starter with lambicus and a mix of dregs from a few Jolly Pumpkin beers (Calabaza and Bam Biere mostly). I plan to pitch this into a version of Mike's Mo Betta Bretta recipe with acid malt....

Does anyone know what, besides brett, is growing in Jolly Pumpkin? Mike mentioned that if there is lacto in there, it could shake things up.

Would lacto take hold in a beer fermented without Sacch?

Mike, since your recipe is published on your maderfermentationist.blogspot.com site already, I hope you won't mind that I put it here:

Mo' Betta Brett 2.0

Recipe Specifics

----------------

Batch Size (Gal): 4.00

Total Grain (Lbs): 10.50

Anticipated OG: 1.062

Anticipated SRM: 5.6

Anticipated IBU: 13.9

Brewhouse Efficiency: 63 %

Wort Boil Time: 75 Minutes

Grain/Extract/Sugar

----------------------

7.00 lbs. Pilsen (2 Row)

1.00 lbs. Munich Malt (dark)

1.00 lbs. Sauer(acid) Malt

0.75 lbs. Oatmeal

0.50 lbs. Cara-Pils Dextrine Malt

0.25 lbs. CaraFoam

Hops

------

0.25 oz Magnum @ 45 min.

Yeast

-----

Mixed Brett cultures and 'who knows what else'

tankdeer02/26/08 11:45 AM

Re: Calling Al B...jolly pumpkin?
Hard to say what is actually in them since they're all barrel aged. (Could be lots of bugs in those barrels) But I know that in the ones I've had I couldn't really taste much or any lactic edge. Mostly Brett. Especially the Calabaza (my personal fav)

Jolly Pumpkin has a somewhat distinctive "barrel" character, which is much different from say, Russian River's barrel beers. Which definitely contain both Lacto and Pedio and seem to have more lactic acid balancing with the funk of the Brett.

That's not to say that JP doesn't have any lactic bacteria in them, just that I personally don't notice a any prominent flavors from them

Al B02/26/08 12:34 PM

Re: Calling Al B...jolly pumpkin?
I agree w/ Tank. The isolates I found in Calabaza were Sachharomyces and Brett. Though thats not to say it would not change down the road.

Ryan02/26/08 01:01 PM

Re: Calling Al B...jolly pumpkin?
Thanks Guys

Further Q.

I started my starter with about 40 ml of slurry from my 100% lambicus as well as the bottle dregs.

Will the huge imbalance in volume of the different strain make it impossible for those other species of Brett to show through or is there something more complex than simply cell count in these interactions?

Al B02/26/08 01:57 PM

Re: Calling Al B...jolly pumpkin?
Probably have little effect since the bulk will be lambicus and the one Brett isolate I found in JP is much slower to grow/ferment than other bretts I have in my dungeon. If the dregs were added to, say, chico ale yeast, then the JP brett would surface eventually.

MikeT02/26/08 02:02 PM

Re: Calling Al B...jolly pumpkin?
No problem, and just to clarify I was just using up the end of a bag of carafoam, no reason to get/use both carapils and carafoam as they are pretty much the same thing.

Just like regular yeast different Brett strains have different attenuation rates, so one of the other strains may carry on after the Lambicus stops. As a result you might want to give it some extra time in secondary before bottling, just to make sure everybody is done.

Ryan02/26/08 02:14 PM

Re: Calling Al B...jolly pumpkin?
Mike

Extra time like a few extra weeks? Or months as if it were a true secondary?

Thanks for the heads up on carafoam. All I could figure was greater head retention with no color.

Does the original Mo Betta have cherries or Oak?

Any suggestions for french vs. american?

MikeT02/26/08 03:10 PM

Re: Calling Al B...jolly pumpkin?
It could be extra months… but fermenting with nothing but multiple strains of Brett is beyond my experience. It will all depend how dry it gets and if it looks like fermentation is slowly continuing.

The cherry/wine/vanilla variants were my ideas to give me some variety, although as part of the last Brett swap Tommee did try my first version with dried cherries and Pinot Noir and seemed intrigued by the interesting cinnamon flavor it had developed.

Here is the relevant section of the commercial description:

“This wild yeast ale is made from 2 Row, Flaked Oats, Carapils, and Munich Malts. We added a couple handfuls of German Magnum Hops and let the Brettanomyces Yeast loose. The beer is 6.3% ABV and is served unfiltered. The fermentation produced a ton of fruity esters with Pineapple being the most common in the beer.”

I still haven’t been able to coax pineapple out of Brett C or A, not sure if anyone else has any ideas on the conditions that promote that particularly ester.

tankdeer02/26/08 05:12 PM

Re: Calling Al B...jolly pumpkin?
<<I still haven’t been able to coax pineapple out of Brett C or A, not sure if anyone else has any ideas on the conditions that promote that particularly ester.>>

Re: Calling Al B...jolly pumpkin?
<< still haven’t been able to coax pineapple out of Brett C or A, not sure if anyone else has any ideas on the conditions that promote that particularly ester>>

That's funny. That's all I've gotten when I used B.c.

I'll be growin' up some more soon fer Steve and then I'll use some for a "brettamungus wit" so I'll be sure to add athread there. My hunch since the brett swap is that aeration vs nonaeration affects this strain in ester production. If remember right, temperatures were about the same. I suggest a new thread - I know Cisco has been doing alot of clausenii batches lately.